curious stares, the nudges and the grins. But Troubridge had always been there, ready to ensure that she and her maid had all the privacy they could want.
She looked at the river again. The opposite bank was Cornwall, where she had been born. She closed her fists hard against her sides. She had never thought of it as home. It was merely a place where she had been forced to avoid faces she knew, places where she might be remembered. Montagu had changed that for her. She would have gone mad otherwise. She had once tried to kill herself.
She shivered once more, but not from cold, and pressed her hand to her breast, surprised that her breathing seemed so even. It brought Sir Gregory Montagu back to her thoughts, the day he had died, with the same dignity he had shown in life. He had tried to tell her something, but the two doctors, old friends of his, had insisted she leave the room for a few minutes. He had not recovered. She knew that he had started to die after the fire; he had been trying to save some paintings, in particular one which had brought Adam into her life. A blazing beam had fallen into the studio and smashed him to the floor, and his right hand had been broken and burned beyond recognition. The hand which had brought him fame, and fame to those he had captured on canvas. Which had rendered the elusive quality of Adam's smile, precisely as she had described it.
Almost the last words he had spoken to her were, It's like destiny, my girl. Fate.
What had he meant? Was she still deceiving herself?
She thought of the people who lived in the house behind her, a local boat builder and his wife. Montagu had stayed here several times in the past when he needed to work without interference or arousing local curosity. Perhaps she should not have accepted Troubridge's willing offer of help to come here. London, then? More studios, one pose after another, with her inviolable guard always intact.
She thought of that last time, when she had almost killed Montagu's nephew. I wanted to kill him. The rest was a mist. Adam holding her, the young lieutenant Troubridge suddenly transformed, dangerous, with a pistol in his hand. Others too, but mostly Adam's hands holding her. Like that day when his horse had thrown him and his wound had burst. Dazed and delirious, he had touched her, held her, and she had lain beside him, her body rigid, her mind screaming as the nightmare returned. Groping hands, pulling at her, forcing her to suffer unspeakable rape and violation. When it came to her now, it was endless. And always the pain… Her father's voice somewhere in the fog, pleading and sobbing.
She had fought against Adam's friendship, the growth of the one true feeling she had allowed to blossom. She remembered her own voice, calling out in the night. It's love I want. Not pity. Can't you see that?
She swung round. A horse. She pushed the hood back from her cheek. Two horses. She was breathless, as if she had been running. It had to be him. Nobody used the road at this time of day. Perhaps he was bringing Troubridge with him. To protect her good name. As a witness…
The horse came around the bend in the road, a second rider a few yards behind.
She wanted to run to him, to call his name, but she could not move. Adam was above her one moment, and the next she was in his arms, pressed against him, her arms trapped by the heavy cloak.
'I am so sorry for the delay, Lowenna. The flagship made a signal. I came as soon as I could. If only…' The rest was lost as he put his arm around her shoulders and held her face against his.
She murmured, 'You came.' She saw the uncertainty in his eyes. 'It's all I care about.'
She heard the other rider say, 'I'll wait at the forge, zur. Just call when you needs me.' He sounded awkward but vaguely pleased.
Adam walked with her toward the white-painted house, seeing the river beyond. The girl's shoulders were firm under his arm, her dark hair streaming in the breeze like silk. He tried to piece it together. Troubridge's excitement when he had climbed aboard after his journey from London with Bethune's belongings. Happy that he had become a part of it, nervous that he had gone too far.
He had seen one of the boatswain's mates by the entry port turn and stare as he had seized Troubridge's hands and exclaimed, 'You have saved my life. Don't you know that?'
He hardly saw the room as she guided him to a tall, ladder-backed chair and watched him throw his hat and cloak on to another, the same cloak he had wrapped around her when he had smashed his way into the house in London. He reached for her hands and held them. They were very cold.
'Are we alone?' He did not hear her answer, but began to get up again.
She put her hands on his shoulders, repressing him a little. 'How long do you have? They are over the river, in Saltash. They'll not be back until sunset, I think.'
She touched his face, his cheek, and, gently, his lips. 'I was so afraid. I have thought about you so much, maybe too much.' She shook her head. 'I'm not making very much sense.'
He said, 'I have to rejoin Athena by the dog watches.' He smiled, and the strain fell away from his face; he looked very young. 'That'll be around sunset, too! '
She stood back from him and unfastened the cloak, letting it fall, then she allowed herself to look at him again.
'Sir Gregory told you.' She held up her hand. 'He must have trusted you very much. Otherwise he would have said nothing.'
'I want you, Lowenna. That is all I know and care about. If it takes time, then we will find time. And I want you safe while I am away.'
'Safe?' She watched a gull drift past the window. 'You will be gone soon.'
'You can stay at the house in Falmouth as long as you care to. Grace and Bryan Ferguson will make you most welcome.'
'You know what people will say, and think, Adam. She shelters beneath the Bolitho roof what does she offer in return?' She smiled, as if a cloud had passed away. 'I shall call upon your aunt. She was very kind to me. And she loves you greatly I could feel it.'
He took her hand again but did not look at her.
'Will you give up the studio work?'
'Are you asking me to? Will you give up the sea for me?'
She returned the grip on his hand. 'That was unfair of me. I would never ask it of you.'
Adam saw her sudden anxiety and said, 'Next time we meet…'
He got no further.
Wo. Not the next time, Adam. There may be no next time, who can tell?'
When she spoke again her voice was level, calm, only her eyes giving a hint of tension.
'The first time I saw you… It was something Sir Gregory taught me, made me put above and before all else. Forced me to find myself, maybe by losing myself in others, in the paintings. I gave myself to the work, and could hold all else at bay. Looks and stares, the thoughts too… they meant nothing. He taught me all that, but when you came into that room and looked at me, I felt something. very different.' She repeated, 'Not the next time, Adam. Otherwise we might wait in vain.' She turned her head slightly, as if she had heard something. 'Fate, perhaps?'
Adam said, 'I would never hurt you, Lowenna.'
She slipped from his hand and walked to the far corner of the room.
'It has to be now. I must know, for both our sakes.' Then she was gone, and Adam saw a shoe fall as she disappeared up a narrow staircase he had not seen before.
He stared at his hat and cloak, lying where he had tossed them.
Leave now before you destroy something that was never yours. Another voice persisted, go, and you will never see her again.
He did not remember climbing the unfamiliar staircase, but stooped to recover her other shoe, which had fallen just outside the door.
Perhaps more than anything else the shoe recalled it to him, what Montagu had told him, and the fear and disgust he had seen for himself when he had smashed his way into that room.
He thrust open the door and saw her sitting on the bed, her hair spilling over her shoulders and the sheet which she had drawn across her body, one hand holding it close to her throat as if she were about to pose for another sketch, a new beginning.
The light was poor, but he could see her clothing where she must have thrown it, with the same quiet desperation she had used to kick off her shoes.
He heard himself say again, 'I would never hurt you, Lowenna.'
